In my line of work, fenceline discussions are more often about pollution from chemical manufacturers that border residential communities -- "fenceline communities" like those all up and down Cancer Alley in Louisiana. But the fenceline images below are in keeping with the set of landscape photographs I referred to in a post last week. And rather than the western scenery captured by Jesse Chehak in those images, the ones below (taken by my wife) are of a regular old central Virginia farm site. They put the human contrivance of fencing, bordering, containing, demarcating , etc., in contrast with the uncontrived terrain. To a point, of course, since the terrain itself is the result of centuries of molding and management and deliberate control.
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Hi Benjamin:
You write: "They put the human contrivance of fencing, bordering, containing, demarcating , etc., in contrast with the uncontrived terrain", and then that "the terrain itself is the result of centuries of molding and management and deliberate control."
I'm not sure what you mean by "terrain" or why you emphasize "centuries". Obviously, as there are horse(?) paths in the first shot and a tractor in the second, the grasses are quite immediately molded and managed by domesticated animals and modern technology on top of any historical modifications.
Similarly, while the banks of shrubs and trees in the background of each shot might be less "contrived" - though the one with the shed behind it is simply its own kind of fenceline and only historical analysis could tell us how recently the other "forest" faces returned to abandoned(?) patches - the fences bound more "contrived" social space than they do the edge between contrived and uncontrived spaces.
Lastly, is it as telling as I think it is that you refer to the VA farm as "regular old... site" and refer to the western photographs as "scenery"? Doesn't that imply that regular old VA is more contrived that the scenic West and thereby recapitulate the naturalism STS and Env'tal History have so powerfully undermined?
Alan
Alan, Thanks for the comment, though I can't say I follow your (Kierkegaardian) leaps of (faith) interpretation. First, it isn't clear why noting that the landscape has been shaped for centuries precludes the observation that the landscape is also currently being shaped. (I noted "centuries" because I've done research on land use in this area from the 18th century, and have some familiarity with patterns of said use and change.) Second, I'm not sure why one would interpret the images as a game of ranking - "the fences bound more "contrived" social space than they do the edge between contrived and uncontrived spaces." Oh, also, I have no idea what that means. Third, "is it as telling as I think it is that you refer to the VA farm as "regular old... site" and refer to the western photographs as "scenery"? Nope. Unless, unless, you were being facetious, playing an academic parlor game. In which case, my apologies for misinterpreting your playful over-interpretation. Benjamin
Wow, snarky. I wasn't playing a parlor game. As far as I am concerned, you can't logically claim that the fencing etc. is a human contrivance relative to an uncontrived terrain if you are also going to claim that the terrain is a contrivance. If both are contrivances then it seems to me that one can't be uncontrived. Did I misinterpret something you wrote?
Since this is my position, and I really could have missed something in your post or not have enough experience with your work to know where you stand on some key issues in environmental history, my thought was that you could have been referring to a ranking - since you note that both the boundaries and the terrain are contrived and my interpretation was that you, nevertheless, claim one is a contrivance and the other is uncontrived - at least that seemed one way out of what seemed to be an inconsistency in your argument.
My point about the regular old farm site and the western scenery - which you don't answer, despite almost surely having read Leo Marx, David Nye and others on pastoralism, romanticism, naturalism and the sublime - seems to miss the way that your use of terms in the two blog posts could easily be read to imply that the western "scenery" was being presented as less or un-contrived (as more natural) and the farm site is explicitly being presented as contrived (except for the differentiation you initially make between the contrived boundary markers and the uncontrived terrain).
It is possible we are talking past one another due to using contrivance differently but I can't tell because either my comments were unclear (often the case) or because you didn't actually answer any of the issues I tried to raise (which seems to be part of the problem) or some combination of the two (most likely, in my eyes.)
Sorry to have pissed you off, I certainly intended to challenge some stuff you wrote but I swear I didn't intend anything more than that.
Alan